Microsoft Office 12 Technical Beta Released

Microsoft Corp. today announced the technical beta release of the new Office system, code-named Office 12 and 10,000 customers and partners get to preview it.

Excerpts from a Microsoft Press Release says

“Microsoft Corp. today announced the technical beta release of the new Office system, code-named Office “12.” The technical beta is available only to nominated customers and partners worldwide and is an important step toward general availability scheduled for the second half of 2006.”

“The next version of Office is the most significant release in more than 10 years and includes new technologies designed to allow information workers to drive greater business success. Now, after many years of research and development, we’re eager to put the software to the test and solicit technical feedback from select customers and partners.”

Microsoft Office 12 broad public beta release is expected this spring. Office is a very powerful suite with Word, Excel and Powerpoint being very popular for daily tasks, though open source tools are gaining popularity too.